


Dream Peaches

by shaenie



Category: LoTR RPS/Sandman
Genre: Crossover, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-02-06
Updated: 2003-02-06
Packaged: 2017-10-12 05:00:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/121067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shaenie/pseuds/shaenie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Dream King encounters a mortal of uncommonly strong dreaming depths.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dream Peaches

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  This is a Sandman/LOTR RPS crossover, and will not likely make sense if you haven't ever read at least a few issues of The Sandman.

The scent of peaches drew him, a particularly rich and layered scent. It was unusual here, unusual in depth and texture, especially for something so simple. In the Dreaming, things were softened, vague, sometimes even present only as ideas, nothing that arched and slid against the senses like this scent. Not that there weren't vivid dreams here, but dreams like that, dreams that he could feel hovering at the edges of his vast consciousness during every moment, those dreams were laden with dark emotion as well, they screamed of lust and hate and fear and need.

This scent-dream did not spill intensity, did not splash desperation out onto the fabric of the Dreaming. It was simple, it was small, but it was very deep.

He had smelled peaches before - real peaches, in the waking world - but they had never smelled like this. Nothing like this, but perhaps that had to do with who he was, what he was. Perhaps he wasn't equipped to appreciate such things in the waking world, away from dreams.

It existed in duality, this dream-scent. He had been aware of it first in his mind, the pull of it from the edges of his awareness, folding the fabric of his consciousness, and when that had happened, when it had pulled at him, he had made himself into something that could appreciate it, had given himself form, and had smelled it with his nose, then, as well. It was not a dream vortex, no, nothing like that, it was merely a dreamer with some strength of mind, but it was interesting, so he pursued it.

The Dream King could not recall if he had ever tasted a peach, either in the waking world or in the Dreaming.

The dreamer was a young man, barely more than a boy. The dream was little more than a street corner, on which a fruit vendor displayed his wares from a cart. Early summer sun threw thick yellow light across everything, and the Dream King recognized it as memory, the tiniest wisp of memory from the young man's childhood.

The young man's name was Dominic, and he was smiling and dreaming this half-forgotten moment. He did not look surprised to see the Dream King there.

His eyes were the color of unformed dreams, which ever roiled at the edges of the Dream King's perceptions.

"I don't have any money," Dominic told him, but he did not sound concerned over this. "I just like to smell them. I wonder if they would taste like they smell, or if they would disappoint."

He looked at the creature that stood beside the cart, which was full of perfect peaches, ideal peaches. The creature was an incomplete memory, having barely a breath of solidity; it's only purpose in the dream was to keep the young man from satisfying his curiosity about the peaches, as he had never satisfied it in his memories.

When he plucked a piece of fruit from the cart, it said nothing, of course.

Dominic took the offered peach with a wide grin, and if he understood that this dream was different, that it had _diverged_ , he did not show it. He bit into the fruit, eyes widening slightly, surprise and pleasure, and he made a sound, a quiet sound, curiosity finally sated, years old wondering satisfied.

He could not recall the taste of peaches, whether he had once tasted them or not. Dominic seemed delighted with it. The Dream King had intended it thus, had ensured that it would be so when he had touched the fruit, had crafted it with his hand and his will into everything that Dominic had wished and hoped that it would be.

Dominic's lips shone with juice, and the Dream King could not recall the taste of peaches.

"You have stars in your eyes," Dominic said. He cocked his head slightly, and his eyes gleamed with the force of his mind. The Dream King said nothing. "Stars are only far away suns. They can burn you."

Since this was true, the Dream King said nothing again.

"Would you like to taste it?" Dominic asked, and half raised the fruit in offering.

"Yes," the Dream King said, and did not take the offered peach.

Dominic let his hand fall, let the peach fall, and said: "Taste."

He recovered the taste of peaches from Dominic's mouth; Dominic's strong dreaming mind echoed the cool, pale taste of his own lips back to him.

******

When Lucian returned to the Palace an orchard had grown there, butting up against the walls as though trying to crowd inside.

They were peach trees, and they bore both blooms and fruit, and the smell of them permeated everything.

"When did this happen?" he asked the griffin.

The griffin's head swayed back and forth as it surveyed the orchard. Its voice was a growling rumble. "An hour ago. And nothing has moved in the Dreaming since they grew."

Lucian's brows rose up in question and misgiving.

The dragon looked away, but the griffin merely returned his gaze grimly.

"I'll talk to him," Lucian said, and his voice felt oddly heavy in his chest.

******

"I never left the Dreaming, Lucian. Nor does the Dreaming require my attention to function." He was seated on his throne, and the feel of the arms under his curled fingers was alien.

"Not your full attention, My Lord, no," he said. His hands gestured nervously, but his voice was calm and precise. "Not even a fraction of your _potential_ for attention, though things do get on better when we have that. But . . . " He paused, and his hands fluttered. "But there has always been _some_ of your attention here, my lord. You always leave some _part_ of your . . ." He did not finish, did not conclude the thought, the sentence. It would have been too much like an accusation. Instead, he said: "It was only a few hours, but _no one_ dreamed, my lord. In that time, there were no paths to take that would lead them here. The Dreaming was sealed."

The Dream King said nothing.

******

Three times Dominic dreamed of the taste of his lips, cool and clean and stark. Each dream was stronger than the last, and if Dominic had known how, known even that it was possible, he could have summoned the Dream King with the potency of them.

Dominic did not know how to force him; The Dream King did not go.

The fourth dream was of the taste of someone else's lips, warm and soft and eager. Like the peaches, like the taste of the Dream King's lips, the dream was a memory.

For a time, those that slept dreamed in fragments that left them without rest and without peace, and the sun never showed itself in these dreams.

For a time, the sun did not show itself in the Dreaming, either.

The orchard burned but for one lone tree, snugged into a hidden niche in the Palace wall. The scent of peaches had given way to the thick pall of ashes.

  
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End file.
